there were sometimes fans to be ducked. The corridors also sloped at the junctions so that there were no straight corners, and this was disconcerting when the corridor you were meeting ran up-and-down, even when it was the equivalent of a capillary and could be gotten over with one good jump.
Zena balked at the first of these that we encountered and had to be prodded before she would cross it.
“I don’t want to,” she said. “I can’t jump that far.”
“All right,” I said. “But if you don’t come along, you’ll just be left here all alone in the dark.”
That made her mind up for her and she found that she could jump it, and with very little effort, either.
But I’ll have to admit that old-collecting-chute-hand or not, I wasn’t prepared for what we found next. In the darkness, there was no floor in front of us. Above us, no ceiling. My light showed our own corridor resuming in the far side of the gap, fully six feet away. The floor sloped sharply down and the air rushed strongly along. I had never encountered an up-and-down duct of this size before.
“Well, what is it?” Zena asked.
There were handholds at the side on which to cross the gap, and holding onto one of these, I leaned over and dropped a piece of broken chalk in a futile attempt to gauge the depth of the cross-duct. I listened, but never heard a sound.
“It must connect one level with the next,” I said. “A main line. I bet it goes straight down to the First Level.”
“Well, don’t you know?”
“No. I don’t,” I said. “I’ve never been here before.”
I wasn’t about to jump that distance, so I examined the hand- and footholds carefully. If you slipped and fell, and it was as far down as I suspected, all that would be left of you would be jam. I shone my light up and down, and the beam only managed to nibble at the blackness. The holds went up-and-down, too, as well across, a ladder that went much farther than I could see.
“Maybe it connects with the Fourth Level down there,” Zena said, “but where does it go to up there?” She pointed straight up the duct.
I didn’t know. The Fifth Level was the very last, the outside, but this duct went beyond the Fifth. Air chutes don’t lead into blind corners and air doesn’t come from nowhere.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But as long as we’re here, why don’t we see where it goes?”
I reached over and put my toe in the inset in the wall. Then I grabbed the first handhold I could reach and swung out. They were good firm holds and while the distance straight down bothered me a little, as long I couldn’t see how far down it was I wasn’t really scared. I once had the experience of walking along a board three inches wide while it was set on the ground—I went the whole length and probably could have walked on for a mile and never fallen off. Then the board was raised into the air and I was challenged to try again. When it was set on posts ten feet high, I wouldn’t even try it because I knew I couldn’t make it. This was something of a similar situation, and as long as I couldn’t see I knew I wouldn’t worry.
I grabbed the next hold and started up. Before I could get anywhere, Zena leaned over and held me by the foot. “Hey, wait up,” she said and gave my foot a tug.
“Watch it!” I said sharply. “You’ll make me fall.” I tried to jerk my foot loose, but she wouldn’t let go.
“Come on back down,” Zena pleaded.
Reluctantly I came down. I said, “What is it?”
“You can’t go and just leave me.”
“I’m not leaving you,” I said. “Just follow me and you can’t be left behind.”
“But I’m scared,” she said.
That was really the time for her to finally admit it. We had both known that from the beginning, but she had refused to admit it until things were getting interesting.
“It’s not going to hurt you,” I said. “All we have to do is climb until we find out what’s up there.” I could see she was wavering, caught between the fear of climbing the ladder and the fear of being left behind. “Come on,” I said. “You first.” I wanted her to go first. That way she couldn’t grab me again.